


Cousins at the Cross-Section

by hpgleek96



Category: Eureka (TV), Warehouse 13
Genre: 4x05 Crossing over, Donovan Cousins AU, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-10
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:08:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29964096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hpgleek96/pseuds/hpgleek96
Summary: So I can't be the only one who watched Warehouse 13 and Eureka and thought they wasted an opportunity not making Zane from Eureka Claudia and Joshua's cousin, right? Same last name, sarcastic, similar fields, it practically writes itself. So I rewrote the Eureka crossover episode 4x05 Crossing Over
Kudos: 7





	Cousins at the Cross-Section

Jo tried not to roll her eyes when she saw the red carpet outside Café Diem, with the table of pastries, courtesy of Vincent. Fargo was always _way_ too intense when he got a crush, and this VIP was supposed to be here on government business. Hopefully this wouldn’t result in a formal complaint. The last thing the six of them needed was Mansfield poking his head around for any reason, even if it was just Fargo being Fargo.

“I have a team standing by ready to transport the neutralizing agent as soon as it’s approved by the agent from Warehouse 13,” Jo said.

“Good, good,” Fargo muttered as he tried to uncork the bottle of champagne he’d ordered. At 9 in the morning.

“Here,” Jo grabbed the bottle and pulled the cork out before placing it in the bucket of ice that had been set out. Was anyone even going to drink it?

Vincent came rushing in with another platter. “Breakfast croissants and muffins to go, Fargo. Savory and sweet.”

“Ah, just like our VIP.”

Carter strolled up, “Fargo, this isn’t the Bachelor you know.”

“Yeah, says you,” Fargo said in a voice more appropriate for a twelve year old boy than the head of a secret government research facility full of geniuses.

Another voice came up from behind Jo. “Muffins, sweet,” Jo automatically smacked Zane’s arm that snaked towards the pastries. “Oh, cut me some slack.”

“She’s here.” A black van rolled up to the red carpet, and Fargo starting straightening his tie and jacket. And kept straightening his tie and jacket. The door opened, and a red headed, young woman with sun glasses in jeans and a leather jacket stepped out of the car. As she took off her sun glasses Jo felt a pit form in the bottom of her stomach. _So that’s what she was doing now. Why can’t I have just one boring day without a Donovan coming in_?

The newcomer waved with a hesitant smile, “Sup Bitches.”

“Claudia?” Zane asked, surprised to see her.

She seemed equally taken aback. “Zane? What are you doing here, I thought you were still, uh,” Claudia hesitated before choosing her next words, “living somewhere else.”

“Out on parole working for GD. What are you doing in Eureka?”

“Doug whipped up some new goo for the Warehouse, I’m here to test it and bring it back. Ooh, snacks.”

Zane narrowed his eyes, “Doug did huh?” Jo barely managed to keep the smile off of her face when she saw Zane do a remarkable impression of her brothers meeting her prom date. She half expected him to start cracking his knuckles.

“Yeah, I upgraded the Warehouse computers to Class 7 standards, I figured I could enhance their goo too. How do you two know each other?” Doug motioned between the two of them, eyes flitting back and forth, and making Jo wonder if he’d noticed the last name.

Zane’s narrowed eyes changed to a full on glare. “She’s my cousin.”

“Yeah, I didn’t realize you were in Eureka, would have called. Definitely would have asked your mom for copies of your baby pictures.”

“Ok, that’s not necessary, no one needs to see those.”

“I feel like everyone should see Christmas of ‘85,” Claudia said, smirking a little, clearly having a very good day.

“Ok, then, come on, meet the troops. Everyone, this is Claudia Donovan.” Fargo stepped in, “On the end is…”

“Jo, right? Yeah Doug said you were a major babe that kicked major ass”

“Did he?”

“And of course, Zane here.”

“And you must be the infamous Sheriff Carter.”

“How’d you guess?” Carter asked.

“I don’t know, something Sheriffy about you.” Claudia smiled then leaned her arm on Fargo’s shoulder, “So Director Doug, where’s my goo?”

“Just so you know, goo, just sounds wrong.”

“It’s a neutralizing insulation to keep artifacts stable during transport, I whipped up a batch using alkalizing agents.”

“Well isn’t that nice of Doug?” Zane asked, with a sneer on his face, walking around Fargo to Claudia’s other side. “Why don’t we all check out this goo, and then my little cousin and I can spend some time catching up while she’s in town? Hm?”

Jo barely managed to hold in her snickers as Fargo was very obviously holding back a stammer in response to Zane’s sudden overprotectiveness. “Uh, yeah, I mean…”

Jo decided to save Fargo. “Zane, you’ve got a prototype to finish rebuilding, so why don’t you get started on that. Claudia tests her insulating agent, gets a tour of GD from the director and chief of security, and you two meet up for lunch? We can end the tour at your lab.”

“Fine,” to Claudia Zane grinned, “I can show you the flying motorcycle.”

“Flying motorcycles baby, that’s what I’m talking about! Lead the way gentlemen.”

Carter leaned over to Jo. “This isn’t going to end well.”

Jo scoffed. “They’re both impulsive geniuses who like to play around with the laws of the universe, and hack secret government organizations for fun. What could go wrong?”

“You know her?”

“She’s never met me.” Her hand came up to fiddle with the chain at her neck, “I don’t understand why Zane never got back in touch with her, they used to text constantly. I wonder if he even knows about Joshua.”

“Maybe it’s the same reason that this Zane and the _other_ Jo never worked things out in this timeline.” Carter patted Jo on the shoulder and went off to the station while Jo got in her car and followed Fargo and the Donovans to GD.

Later that day, Fargo was most of the way through his tour with Claudia, now leading her through the promenade, while Jo and Carter were coming in through another entrance to meet them. “So, up next we’ll take a peek at the Robotics Lab, you can meet Deputy Andy. He just got his face reskinned, he’s got a whole new look.”

“You built a real terminator, nice!”

Jo cut in, “Claudia, they’re loading your truck now.”

“Thanks Jo, but no need to rush our guest.”

Carter leaned in to smooth things over with his usual small town sheriff charm. “Are you enjoying the tour?”

“Yeah, the nano-tech lab was impressive, the underground bio-sphere was off the chart. But I don’t know, this is Eureka, right? I was kind of hoping to see something insanely weird.”

“Consider yourself lucky,” Carter chuckled.

As if Claudia had summoned a more interesting day merely by speaking it into existence, the floors and walls of the Rotunda started shaking. Red light began crackling and concentrating in streaks across the floor, as Carter began shouting for everyone to get to the edges. The light seemed to form into rods which darkened into… trees?

“Now that’s more like it,” Claudia said, clearly pleased with the turn of events. Seriously, how did Fargo not realize that she and Zane were related?

Jo pulled out her PDA, “Can someone check the structural integrity of the building, make sure the trees that appeared in the rotunda aren’t going to make it come crashing down around us?”

“Trees, in the rotunda?” her second in command Rochester asked.

“They’re here, I’m staring at them. Get to it, and send up a cleanup crew. Carter,” she put her hand over the microphone, “can you call Henry, get him up here?”

“Already on it. Get someone to check exactly how high these trees went,” Carter was pulling out his own PDA as he got ready to handle yet another Eureka disaster.

“Got it. I want the basement labs evacuated, and someone check and see if any systems were compromised by having wood shoot through the building. Miss Donovan, if you could step this way,” Jo and Carter took charge.

“Claudia!” Zane came bounding down the stairs, slipping through the trees. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine. This is awesome! Come on, help me get a look at these,” Claudia pulled a scanner out of her bag and dragged Zane off to look at the damage when Henry walked in, more sedately then Zane had.

“Wow, you were not kidding when you said there was a tree problem Jack. Let me take a closer look, I’ll see what I can find out.”

“Kay, thanks.”

“I planned everything so perfectly,” Fargo whined to Carter.

‘Yeah, because that usually works out for you. So,” he clapped his hands together, “what’s up with Sherwood Forest?”

Henry looked away from the trees. “They are Sequoia sempervirens, redwoods. Indigenous to Eureka.”

“But inside and fused to the building,” Carter said.

“Well, not exactly. I mean, if you look at the damage, you'll see that they actually displaced the floor and the ceiling. I've never seen anything like it.”

“One day of getting to look like I know what I’m doing, was that too much to ask for?” Fargo said, not seeming to grasp the big picture problem.

“Evidently.”

“This is so cool. Uno, you reinforced G.D. With tungsten? That's one of the strongest metals ever. Dos, the trees punched right through it. I mean, how crazy is that?”

Carter suddenly seemed to realize that Claudia was still there. “Should she be seeing all this?”

“She signed a non-disclosure statement,” Jo said before going back to surveying the damage that was conveniently on the opposite side of the room as Zane.

“Yeah, you can trust me. I was a Campfire girl.”

“Please tell me you kept the uniform,” everyone started as Fargo blurted that out. “For posterity, you know memories,” he trailed off.

“Anyhoo, I scanned the trees for transient radiation, you know, just for kicks. If you guys want, I mean, I could stick around, help analyze the results.”

“I love that idea. I mean that would be really helpful, right?”

“Well, as a matter of fact, I was going to suggest the same thing. So, shall we?” Henry said.

“Apres-vous,” Claudia gestured towards Henry, then called behind her, “Zane, you coming?”

“I’m not sure they want…”

“Actually that would probably be for the best. Zane?” Henry waved him along.

“Okay.” Zane looked surprised, and looked around to the others, surprised that no one was sending Henry to the infirmary to have his head checked. _First Lupo last week, now Henry trusting me? What is going on?_

“Okay, so the tree rings outside are all showing this black band from the Mt. St. Helen’s eruption, but none of the trees inside are. So we’re dealing with trees that are native to the area, but didn’t grow here?”

Carter rushed into where Fargo, Claudia and Zane were hunched over tablets. “Hey, we got another thing that appeared out of nowhere.”

“What happened, I didn’t feel the building shake or anything,” Fargo asked.

“It wasn’t at GD, it was at Café Diem. And Jo got shot with a bullet that was never even fired.”

“Wait what!” Zane’s knuckles went white as his grip on the tablet tightened. “Is she okay?”

“Allison says she’ll be fine, but if bullets or trees, or anything else keep popping up where there’s already buildings or people, we’re going to have bigger problems.”

“Yeah, right. So Henry tested all the trees outside of G.D. They all showed the same Mount St. Helens rain pattern.” Fargo said as he and Claudia went with Carter, leaving Zane behind them.

“So, random redwoods and unfired bullets. In my world this reeks of artifact.”

“Everything in Eureka can be explained with science. Whether that's anger rays or red elves…”

“Now you’re speaking my lingo.”

“All right, what about teleportation?”

“Hey,” Claudia popped up next to Zane as he was leaving the infirmary. “How’s Jo doing?”

“She’s too stubborn to die. Blake says that she’ll be fine in a few hours,” Zane pulled out his PDA. “Look I gotta get back to working on the cruiser, but I’ll see you in a bit.”

“What are you talking about? Isn’t this sort of thing right up your alley? You should come with me, help out with the whole teleportation situation.”

“They don’t want my help. They’ve always made that pretty clear.”

Claudia frowned. “But this is Eureka, isn’t your whole shtick ‘nothing in the way of scientific advancement’ and all that?”

Zane just scoffed. “Yeah, unless you happen to be the town felon who’s only here because the federal government figured if they were going to have to pay to house you, they might as well make a buck off your brain while they do it. I’m on parole, one step from getting sent back to prison Claudia.”

“Dude you’ve been here how long, and you, what, managed to make sure no one would miss you if you get sent back?” Claudia punched his arm and shook her head, “Seriously, no one’s tried to help you, or keep you around at all in the last year?”

“Look that’s not what I, forget it, it’s complicated.”

“Oh, did Zaney get himself a girlfriend?”

“No, it’s not like that at all, trust me,” Zane said.

“Okay, if dudes are something you’re into.”

“Not that either.”

“Okay, so what,” she cut herself off, and looked over her shoulder. “Lupo, huh?”

“What, no, it’s not like that. She automatically comes to interrogate me when things go wrong around here, and given that she just got a giant bullet removed from her chest, I figured that I would save her the trouble of getting up or having one of her goons grab me,” Zane said.

“And you’ve got a crush.”

“Don’t be ridiculous.”

“I’m just saying, sitting at her bedside while she’s all ‘Sleeping Beauty’. You might want to try talking to her. Using actual words.”

Zane’s face went pale, and he grabbed Claudia’s arm, pulling her in. “Keep your mouth shut, are you trying to get me tased again?” he whispered.

“She didn’t look like she was going to tase you man.”

“Look, I tried that when I first came to Eureka. I struck out. Several times. I ask her out again, she will rearrange my organs. She even told me her ideas for the new configuration in great detail.”

“You sat next to her bedside, and you really expect me to believe you when you say nothing’s going on, or nothing’s changed between you since then?”

He was quiet for a minute. “I don’t know. A couple weeks ago she kept Mansfield from carting me off to prison, insisted on doing an actual investigation. It turns out it was not my fault I passed out and crashed a flying motorcycle prototype into the general’s car, but still. That morning if you’d asked me what I thought she’d do in that situation, I’d tell you she’d get a kick out of slapping cuffs on my wrists and be happy to see the last of me.”

“Hey, maybe she’s warming up to you. This could be good.”

“Yeah, if you want my dick to get ripped off.”

“Hey, you need someone who can give you a kick in the ass and keep you in line, I fail to see how this is a bad thing.”

“Gee, thanks Claudia. I love you too.”

“Damn straight you do.”

“By the way, how are you doing, with you know, the whole teleportation thing? It’s got to be bringing back some less than pleasant memories,” at Claudia’s confused face, he continued, “I looked into the accident, found Joshua’s grant proposal.”

“Oh, right that. Um, well, it’s not quite the same thing. And Joshua’s fine now, so that makes it easier,” Claudia kept walking, while Zane stood stock still, replaying in his head what Claudia had just said so very casually.

“Claudia,” Zane said, his voice measured, “can we talk in private real quick?”

“Yeah sure, I’m also just realizing we never had this conversation,” Claudia said.

“Yeah,” Zane pulled Claudia into an alcove, rubbing a hand over his face. “Claudia, what do you mean when you say Joshua’s fine now.”

“So, it turns out Joshua didn’t actually die, he just got, you know, stuck.”

“Stuck?”

“In a sort of interdimensional limbo. Artie and I got him out, he’s in Geneva, working at the Cern. The asshole didn’t even age, and he’s perfectly fine and healthy.”

“Joshua’s fine.”

“Yeah. Look, we can skype him later if you want to see for yourself. I didn’t call you when it happened because I thought you were still in prison, and well, this isn’t the sort of conversation you want other people to overhear.”

“I get that, when did this happen?”

“About six months ago, maybe a little longer.”

Zane went over what he knew of Claudia’s life recently, and tried to figure out how to phrase his next question. “I’m guessing this is completely unrelated to your time at the Mellinger Psychiatric Clinic?”

“How do you know about that?”

“I kept an eye on you.” Claudia just kept staring at Zane. “Look they wouldn’t let my mom apply for custody after everything, and after I turned eighteen, I tried, no luck. I think your parents put in their will that they didn’t want my dad getting you guys if anything happened to them, and considering our dads being brothers was how my mom and I tried justifying it, I think our claims got thrown out. Also I’d screwed up enough at that point that no one wanted to hand me a middle schooler.”

“I’m pretty sure they put that in because he was crappy to you guys. Though given that he didn’t even show up to my parents’ and Claire’s funeral, or Joshua’s, I’m guessing they might not have been that close either.”

“Probably, though how do you know about that? You would have been little when that all happened.”

“I overheard Nana calling your dad a deadbeat and kept asking different adults what that word meant until someone answered me. Seriously though, how did you know about the clinic?”

“I wanted to make sure you were okay, even if I couldn’t go see you myself. Besides, you paid for it with” he cut himself off.

“I paid for it with a trust from…” Claudia paused, then ducked her head close to Zane’s, voice shaking a little. “Zane?”

“Yes…”

“I don’t suppose it’s a coincidence that you know about the ‘trust account’ that I for some reason got access to when I was 14 that the state and my foster parents had no clue about or records of? That was completely unconnected to the money I got when I was eighteen?” when Zane stayed silent, she prodded, “Zane?”

“Like I said, I wanted to make sure you were okay. You hear horror stories about the system, and I figured if I couldn’t get you out of it the normal way, I’d offer you a way out if you needed it.”

“That account had $100,000 in it! Where did you get that kind of money?”

“Claudia, I’m on parole in Eureka because I stole 3.1 million dollars from the US government. Are you sure you want to ask questions about where that money came from?”

“Zane.”

“Relax, that account was set up before that happened. I doubt Gates even realized it was gone.”

“What!”

Zane tried to deflect, “Look, you can’t give it back now, it’s a little late for that, so enjoy it. Buy yourself a nice computer, or more hair dye, or whatever you spend your money on these days. What do 19 year old girls like?”

“You know, that is kind of sweet. Very illegal, but very sweet.”

“Don’t go spreading that around, I have a reputation to maintain.”

“You are a softie. Complete and utter softie.” Claudia threw her arms around his neck and pressed a loud kiss to his cheek.

“Stop it, don’t you have to go do something with trees and unfired bullets?”

“Yeah, Carter’s tracking down the head of the Quantum Particle Entanglement department.”

“I didn’t think any of Wheeler’s tests had worked. All of her theories are based on bullshit.”

“Still, she’s the expert.” She pulled out her phone and checked her texts. “Carter says she’s at Café Diem, let’s go.”

“Claudia, look.”

“Hey, you went to school for particle physics, you could be helpful. Come on. If anyone says anything we can just say it was my idea, they probably won’t want to insult the visitor.”

“Fargo would probably let you get away with murder while you’re here.”

“Yeah, he’s sweet.”

“He’s too old for you.”

“Oh my god, we are not talking about this. It’s none of your business.”

“So, that’s the perp? Want me to get my electro-cuffs, I can be a great bad cop.”

Carter’s eyes widened as he looked over at Claudia, “We don't really do good cop, bad cop.”

“Oh, you play it straight, that’s classy.”

Zane just rolled his eyes, “Oh, now you have something against electro-cuffs?”

“You were a prisoner. And a complete pain in the ass, who ruined my credit score.”

Zane nodded, “Fair enough.”

Carter looked at the cousins, and considered, “Why don’t you two wait by the counter, listen in, tell me if she says anything off.” He walked over to the woman sitting by herself with a data pad. “Dr. Wheeler?”

“Yes Sheriff?”

“Hi. I want to talk to you about the trees that appeared in G.D.”

“I had nothing to do with that.”

“Well, you are the resident teleportation expert.”

“It’s not teleportation, its quantum particle entanglement.”

“Well, making things move by zapping, same thing.”

“Listen, I'd be ecstatic if I had done any of that to those trees, but all my test trials failed. I can't even teleport this croissant.”

“If I had a nickel.” Then, a familiar sound started up, and red light started to gather throughout the Café. Carter started yelling for everyone to get out, Zane and Claudia dragging each other and grabbing other people on their way out. The shaking got worse as the café was evacuated, until it stopped. They all rushed back into Café Diem.

And stopped short.

Because they were used to seeing a lot of things in Eureka. Lasers, nuclear reactors, organic computers, and space ships, just to name a few.

But P-38s bomber airplanes? Those hadn’t been seen in Eureka in a while.

But Sheriff Carter had seen them before. And he was pretty sure he knew where.

And when.

Dr. Wheeler piped in, “This better not show up in my performance review. This looks to me like someone’s fooling around with wormholes.”

Zane noticed Carter paling, which was, odd, considering every interaction Zane had ever had with the man. Claudia on the other hand, was staring at the plane in wonder.

“This is, like, warehouse-issue vintage. I wonder when this was built.”

“I’m guessing the 1940’s.”

Zane smirked, and never missing an opportunity to irritate the local law enforcement, “You saw them flying around when you were a kid, that how you know that?”

Carter just turned to Claudia. “You still have those electro-cuffs? Please tell me they have a high voltage.”

“I think this counts as police brutality and harassment.”

“No, it’d be police brutality if I let Jo tase you as much as she’d like to. Come on, let’s wait outside for Henry to get here, let him do some tests.”

Zane tried to ignore the light drizzle, which got harder when his socks got wet and he could feel them squish when he shifted his feet. Which he kept doing, because Henry took forever to get there, and then when he got there, he took his time doing different scans. Zane tried to get a look at the different readings he was taking, but the light kept shifting, and every time he got any results, Henry made sure the pad was turned away from the windows and door. And whatever he was seeing, he didn’t like.

Eventually Henry came out of the café, “I have the microfracture results from the plane. It's almost new.”

Fargo just looked confused, as the spoiled little legacy always did. “P-38s haven’t been manufactured since World War II.”

Did no one else see it? “Dr. Wheeler mentioned wormholes, and I think she’s right. Everything was displaced by the objects, and the lights, shaking and sound could very well be wormholes opening and closing. The trees without the ash ring and a brand new WWII fighter plane?” Zane said.

“Which means it’s possible these things could be moving through time and space. We could be talking about time travel.” Claudia finished, clearly on the same wavelength as him.

“Who says they’re even moving through space, maybe there was a military base here before the DOD decided to use it for their pet genius project?” Zane’s brain started whirling with calculations, and trying to figure out who, if anyone, had gotten it right? And who had opened up the wormholes that had gotten time travel working, even if it was unstable.

Very unstable, he reminded himself, as he remembered the brush of Lupo’s cold fingers taking the magazine from him in the infirmary.

He faintly heard Carter saying something about needing to do more research, and Henry asking Claudia to check out some surges. Claudia going off to do field work with the creepy little dictator barely even registered with him right now. Someone needed to figure out what the hell had started these wormholes, and Henry was looking at surges? Why was he looking at that, when they should be looking for…

“I’m going to recode the satellites at GD, see if I can find traces of exotic particles, that’ll tell us if these things really are travelling through time. Maybe there’s a commonality, or I can find the origin point.”

Henry and Carter looked at each other, seemed to have an entire conversation with their eyes, before Henry gave the okay. “See if you can map out the disturbances as they come in, that might help narrow the search field. And try not to get displaced by something.”

“Got it.” Zane got back on his bike and headed back to GD and went up to the room where they controlled the satellites. He got to coding and rewiring the satellites so they’d map out exotic particles, sat back and waited. The room shook twice, and according to his PDA, tubs of oil and a fence were the cause. Hopefully none of them had displaced people. His program beeped, telling him that it had finished running, and he looked it over hoping there was a pattern of some kind, some explanation.

He’d screwed his code up somehow.

That was the only explanation. According to this, not only had exotic particles been found, there were exotic particles all over Eureka, which didn’t match up with anything from today. They were in GD, they were in town, they were in the roads, and even in some of the less populated areas. There were far more particles than disturbances, and they were in various states of decay as well, as some spots were faint, and others were brightly saturated, as though they’d been bleeding exotic particles for weeks, if not months. Zane went back to his code and tried to find the bug. Because that was the only logical explanation.

He couldn’t see the bug.

Maybe the satellites had been affected by the surges, gotten damaged by the quakes. He’d gotten an alert saying an old intercontinental missile had been found through the walls in the infirmary, maybe something going through a wall had messed up the systems. He didn’t have time, or the ability to go traipsing through the walls of GD, and Lupo would probably drag herself out of her sickbed to throw him in jail if he tried, even if he was actually trying to be helpful. The only thing he could do was look at the equipment that was here.

Halfway through his diagnostic of the calibration system, Zane’s PDA beeped. _All items that appeared suddenly today have disappeared, the displaced locations are still damaged. Take care when navigating areas with disturbances._

So that was that. Guess whatever caused this mess was need to know, and the Powers that Be decided Zane didn’t need to know. At the very least, neither did the rest of the town. He reset the satellites to the scans they were doing when he arrived, and headed downstairs, where hopefully he’d get to see Claudia before she left.

“Hey Zane, we almost got blown up by landmines, but other than that, great day. Dude, you okay?” Claudia came into the entranceway of GD, followed by Fargo and Carter, all of them being careful to avoid the holes in the floor.

“Yeah, I’m fine. Readings on the satellites were way off, they must have been damaged during the surges.”

“I’ll have someone take a look at them once they’re done with the structural issues,” Fargo said.

“Okay, look, I’m going to grab my cousin for lunch before she leaves, if that’s alright with you,” Zane said, making sure his tone made it clear he didn’t care what Fargo thought.

“Yeah, hopefully Vince has something up and running. I don’t think the plane went through the kitchen, so we should be good.” Claudia grinned and flung an arm around his shoulder, and Zane decided to allow her to drag him around, seeing as she had made it clear today that she still saw him as the cool older cousin who taught her how to code.

Speaking of other sassy 19 year olds who didn’t just see him as a screw up, his phone beeped, with a text from someone outside Eureka.

_Zoe Carter: Hey, I’m still having trouble with Schrödinger’s Equation, and I’ve got a final next week. Think I can pick your brains later?_

Zoe, who was one of the few people in town who didn’t care about his record, mostly due to her own. Her messages and skypes had gotten more frequent as the semester went on, and it was nice talking to someone other than his mom who didn’t see him as just a screw up. And the attention was flattering, but clearly not going to go anywhere. Though he was now having trouble not seeing similarities between Zoe and Claudia.

He’d deal with that after she got back in town after finals. Even if she did have a crush, she was a college kid. How long could it last, a month?


End file.
